[German Minghui] The Power of Dafa: Learning to Face New Tasks

(Minghui.org) Greetings, esteemed Master and fellow practitioners.

When I offered my support to the Minghui editorial team in the summer of 2018, I had no idea what significance this project would one day have for me. At that time, I had been practicing Falun Dafa for just a year. Since I lived in a rural area, far from big cities, it was not possible for me to attend information-day activities. When a practitioner reported how important the Minghui website was for both practitioners and non-practitioners, I decided to give it a try.

For about a year-and-a-half, I mainly translated cultivation articles for Minghui, which also helped me in my personal development.

After that, I was assigned to another team of translators responsible for news and persecution reports. In retrospect, this had a deep impact on my work with Minghui. The individual fates of the persecuted practitioners made it tough for me. It seemed as if I was connected to the people in China reported on in each article. Images of prisons, instruments of torture, and screams filled my dreams at night. I often woke up drenched in sweat and crying. Translating the articles was tough—they were about repulsive and disgusting torture and sometimes very long, even running to 18 pages.

I complained inwardly and longed to return to my earlier work. I longed for the cultivation articles that had been so easy for me to translate.

When I looked within, jealousy was my main problem and became strikingly apparent to me. I was terribly envious of everyone who was allowed to continue translating cultivation articles, prose, or the miracles of Falun Dafa. When I discussed this with my new team, I realized how ridiculous my attitude was. My colleagues had been translating such articles for more than 10 years—week after week, day after day. They encouraged me to stick with it and take the pressure off them.

Master says:

“The issue of jealousy is very serious as it directly involves the matter of whether or not you can complete cultivation. If jealousy is not abolished, everything that you have cultivated will become fragile. There is this rule: If in the course of cultivation jealousy is not given up, one will not attain Righteous Fruition—absolutely not.” (Lecture Seven, Zhuan Falun)

As time passed, I learned to control my jealousy and let go of my selfish desire to translate cultivation articles. I thought to myself, “How would people outside China learn about how Dafa practitioners are persecuted if no one translated their experiences?” Furthermore, powerful virtue had to be established within the Minghui project. I realized that every article I translated had something to do directly with me. Reports of cruel torture taught me to keep a kind heart. When practitioners were force-fed feces, I reminded myself to eliminate my rising sense of disgust. In doing so, I realized that the practitioners’ suffering had another, positive side.

There is a poem, “Tempering the Will,” in Master’s Hong Yin. The words helped me to no longer think of the tortured practitioners as victims of the persecution, but as Dafa practitioners who cultivated in the greatest bitterness.

Later, when I also handled headlines, there were occasional reports about Fa conferences, personal experiences in cultivation, or the miracles of Dafa—a welcome change from the persecution ones, which I came to appreciate very much.

Overcoming Tiredness and Lack of Sleep

The work for Minghui, like many other Dafa projects, is voluntary and has to be taken care of in addition to our regular jobs and family. I often don’t start translating the articles until after 8 p.m., which then sometimes drags on deep into the night, several times a week.

To get an overview of the weekly output, the Minghui team members post the number of articles they translate on a list. Sometimes I translated more than 10 articles and still lagged far behind my teammates who delivered more than 20, sometimes even more than 30 translations each week. I have the greatest respect for their consistency.

How one could work so consistently for Minghui over so many years, deep into the night, was a mystery to me for a long time. In the past, it was not uncommon for me to fall asleep while translating. Sometimes, I would wake up and decide to finish it the next day. Once, I noticed the next morning that a long headline had not been completed for this reason. Usually, headlines have top priority and have to be completed the same evening. When I noticed this mistake after the coordinator pointed it out very early in the morning, I translated the rest of the article right after the morning Fa-study starting at 6 a.m., so that the headline could still be published on time.

As time went by, I realized the importance of Fa-study while working for Minghui. Only when I cultivated solidly could I handle both the content and the volume of the persecution articles well. Therefore, I appreciate the morning Fa-study with the Minghui team, which has been an integral part of my cultivation for many years. However, it is not always easy for me to get up at five a.m. to participate. Sometimes my eyes sting or burn, and the words blur, and I close my eyes due to pain.

Once I felt so tired after working all night that I kept dozing off. As soon as it was my turn to read, my main consciousness returned, but faded again by the next paragraph. At that time, we were reading Lecture Five. When I read the heading of the last section, I was confused. Instead of “Zhuyou Ke,” it said “Zhuyou Mi.” I could not explain it. Since I was reading the online version, it meant that this obvious error must have been visible to everyone else as well. But when we talked about it, only my screen showed the wrong heading.

To be certain that I hadn’t lost my mind, I took a screenshot. It really said “Zhuyou Mi!” I was flustered. What did this mean? Throughout the day, my thoughts circled around this erroneous heading in Lecture Five. Not until I looked within in the evening in peace and quiet did I enlighten that it was a hint from Master. I should reject the feeling of being tired with righteous thoughts, a strong “Mie,” which was nothing but interference from the old forces.

Master says,

“You have already developed a habit of abandoning your Main Consciousness. Once you close your eyes, you put your Main Consciousness to rest, and then it disappears. You have already developed this habit.” (Lecture Eight, Zhuan Falun)

After this realization, I decided to get up even earlier and do the second and fifth exercises alongside my husband before Fa-study. In the past, I had often failed to fit the exercises into my daily routine. It was not uncommon for me to fail to do even one exercise because I was so busy and had set my priorities on work, not on the exercises. I asked Master, “Master, please help me! I really want to cultivate solidly and learn the Fa and always use my main consciousness.”

With righteous thoughts and Master’s help, I was able to break this vicious circle. Now, I study the Fa every day and manage to do all five exercises several times a week.

The Minghui Report

The Minghui Report: The 20-Year Persecution of Falun Gong in China was published in German in 2021. I helped with the translation from English. When a group decided to print the book in a high-quality hardcover edition in the fall, it was natural for me to support this project.

During an initial project meeting, our small team realized that we would first have to read the over 500-page report. When we noticed errors and inappropriate wording, we decided to revise the entire report again. We painstakingly corrected section after section, which took several months. This project was an additional challenge for all of us, as we had to keep up with the usual translation work, our families, and our jobs.

At the same time, we were thinking about how we could market the Minghui Report later on. When I came across the Book Fair in Leipzig on the internet, seemingly by chance, the team saw this as a suitable opportunity to draw attention to the book. We signed up with a pre-release version of the Minghui Report and were now working diligently on the translation. But after completion, there were problems with the print file, which was incorrectly formatted. When this problem was finally resolved, the book went to the press. Shortly after, we received information that the Book Fair in Leipzig had been canceled.

I was disappointed and relieved at the same time. Suddenly, the immense stress of the past months disappeared. I had the impression that the sole purpose of registering for the book fair was to speed up the printing of the Minghui Report.

The next task was to design a website for the newly founded Minghui Publishing House. Following the Minghui Publishing Center New York, we tried to implement their requirements as closely as possible. This presented us with additional problems, since completely different laws apply in Germany. The requirements for the imprint, data protection, and general terms and conditions alone presented our team with enormous challenges that could only be met through painstaking work and a great deal of research. In addition, we had to draft additional texts, integrate modules for review, and request ratings for the Minghui Report. All of this proceeded very slowly.

When the books were finally ready to be delivered, our team faced the next hurdle: where to store 1,000 books. We dismissed initial thoughts of renting storage units because of the cost involved. My husband and I made room in our already cramped two-and-a-half-room apartment. A call for help went out to practitioners and we organized additional supporters so that we could unload the books, which were to be delivered on three pallets. In the end, everything went like clockwork. The books were delivered by a forwarding company 15 minutes before the deadline. Half an hour later, they were already stored in our apartment. We had not expected that it would go so quickly. Without Master’s help, this would not have been possible. His presence was clearly felt.

With the delivery of the books, the real work began. The books pre-ordered by practitioners had to be prepared for shipment over the weekend and invoices had to be written. Together with my husband, I had taken on this task. What was lacking, however, was time. Since my husband was heavily involved in other projects during those days, much of the packing of the more than 200 ordered books fell to me. How was I going to manage? I sent righteous thoughts and asked Master for help. A day later, all the supplies were packed, some in packages weighing up to 25 kg (55 pounds). Since we had no vehicle, we again had to ask for help. Fortunately, a neighbor lent us her car, so we were able to overcome this hurdle as well.

Other tasks such as writing invoices, bookkeeping, sending reminders for non-payment, or sending books outside the European Union presented us with new challenges time and again. Sometimes I was at the point of despair. Each time, new tasks piled up in front of me like a mountain. Because of that, I recognized my habit of doing things at the last minute, especially accounting. Then, I remembered Master’s teaching:

“We say that when you take a step back in a conflict, you will find the seas and the skies boundless, and it will certainly be a different situation.” (Lecture Nine, Zhuan Falun)

With Dafa’s guidance and Master’s help, I have learned throughout the years at Minghui to put one foot in front of the other and thus learned to familiarize myself with completely new subjects step by step.

As I understand it, the Minghui Report is not only about selling books but above all about cultivation. I am aware that the newly-established Minghui Publishing House, of which I am a part, will play a great role in the world of ordinary people. With righteous thoughts and the power of Dafa, we will be able to accomplish all the tasks involved.

Master says:

“All of this was brought about by you, and there are still many things that lie ahead—and that will be the case all the way until the day you reach Consummation. You have already passed through the hardest part. What is left won’t be so trying. You just need to do even better with it. The more hopeless things may seem, it’s possible hope will appear right before your eyes. Especially during those times when you are feeling so bored, perhaps you are in fact establishing your mighty virtue. I hope that you can really manage to cooperate well, have strong enough righteous thoughts, look within when you run into things, and be enthusiastic like you were when you first took up cultivation. (“What is a Dafa Disciple,” Collected Fa Teachings, Vol. XI)

Fellow Minghui practitioners, let us establish the powerful virtue of Dafa together so that we can fulfill our vows together and fulfill our contribution in the Fa-rectification within the framework of the Minghui Project.

Thank you, revered Master. Thank you, fellow practitioners.

(Presented at the 2022 Multilingual Minghui Teams Experience Sharing Conference)